The small Ligurian village saw record house values, which are ten times higher than the Italian average and up to 124 times higher than those recorded in Italy’s cheapest locations.
Portofino tops the chart of Italy’s most expensive location, according to the latest figures of the Agenzia del Territorio, Italy’s equivalent of the Land Registry.
Every year, the Agenzia looks at average property values to rank Italian municipalities and the Ligurian village, which is as glitzy as it is tiny, once again made it to first place. Homes here cost up to a whopping €22,440 per square metre—more than fourteen times Italy’s national average of €1,580.
Hot on the heels of Portofino are Cortina d’Ampezzo, a celebrity-studded resort in the Veneto Dolomites, where properties range from €5,610 to €13,770 per square metre and the exclusive island of Capri, where they cost from €5,240 to €14,970 per square metre.
In general, though, seaside locations beat mountain ones when it comes to price. Seven out of Italy’s ten priciest resorts are by the sea—Portofino, Capri, Anacapri, Forte dei Marmi, Santa Margherita Ligure, Alassio and Camogli—against three set on the mountain slopes (Cortina d’Ampezzo, Selva di Val Gardena and Ortisei). In all these places, prices are more than five times higher than Italy’s national average.
For example, homes in Anacapri—Capri’s other municipality—start from €3,220 per square metre (for a peripheral location) and can shoot up to €12,570 per square metre, while those in Selva di Val Gardena (also known as Wolkenstein in Groeden in German) command anything between €3,100 and €11,550. Glamorous Forte dei Marmi, on the Tuscan Riviera, comes just down the pecking order, with prices ranging from €2,700 per square metre up to €14,500 per square metre, followed by Liguria’s three jewels—Santa Margherita, the next resort up from Portofino and a ‘bargain’ at €1,600 to €14,420 per square metre; the thriving town of Alassio, in the Savona province, where properties cost from €2,730 to €9,120 per square metre; and the picturesque fishing village of Camogli, in the Genoa province, where values start from €2,100 and go up to €11,350 per square metre. The most affordable among Italy’s top ten resorts is Ortisei (Sankt Ulrich in German), a mountain village in Trentino Alto Adige. Properties here go from €2,700 to €8,900 per square metre.
Surprisingly, Sardinia’s posh resorts of Porto Cervo and Porto Rotondo didn’t make it into the Agenzia’s most expensive list. This, however, has more to do with the way the Agenzia aggregates its data by municipality than with a sudden drop in prices in these sought-after locations. For example, Porto Rotondo, where homes range from €3,500 to €8,600 per square metre, is only treated as an area within the much cheaper municipality of Olbia. Likewise, Porto Cervo and the neighbouring areas of Romazzino, Cala di Volpe and La Celvia—all exclusive resorts where house prices range from €4,000 to €12,000 per square metre—are lumped together with the far more affordable municipality of Arzachena, thus lowering their ranking.
Another island, Sicily, is home to Italy’s cheapest locations, Poggioreale and Salaparuta. Both municipalities are situated in the Trapani province, both were wrecked and rebuilt after the 1968 earthquake, and both record prices that are less than 1/5 the Italian average at €180 to €260 per square metre. This means a home in either village costs about 1/100 than a property in Portofino—and about 1/20 than the resort’s cheapest parking space.
Italy’s top location by average property prices:
